Gold: New Global High vs. Top 10 Currencies

Jumping to 8-month highs against the Euro, Swiss Franc and Canadian Dollar,
it also took out fresh records versus the Indian Rupee and Chinese Yuan.

And more critically still, gold broke new ground against the world's major
currencies en masse. Critically as in critical.

Buying 200 tonnes of metal from the IMF, the Reserve Bank of India sent gold
to new highs in terms of all the money that counts.

Friday's news that America's job-loss recovery is worsening then confirmed
the new record, peeping just above the previous hit set in Feb. of this year.

Weighted against the world's top 10 currencies by GDP, the price of gold broke
its previous high on Wednesday this week. Shown as a percentage change since
Jan. 2000 above, BullionVault's
Global Gold Index does indeed lag the Dollar price (244% vs. 289% to date),
but it's clearly beaten all other asset classes so far this decade.

And given what India's move says about Dollar diversification (that a lump
of metal yielding zero and trading at all-time record highs also beats holding
Euros, Yen, Yuan, Sterling, Reals, Loonies, Roubles and Pesos...), gold's return
to central-bank bids might be a long way from finished.

Ten years ago, nobody wanted it. Least of all those central banks in Europe
holding the most but about to launch a new currency - one lacking any sovereign-government
backing, let alone a link to gold
bullion.

By the time they stopped selling gold amid the financial crisis wrought by
their last flirtation with record-low returns to cash, the rising powers of
China, India and Russia - moving from fifth, ninth and twelfth to 4th, 8th
and 10th in terms of global GDP respectively - had already begun hoarding metal
themselves.

Now the US, Japan and Europe are holding rates at fresh record lows as near
to zero as damn it. The official bid for gold, let alone private-sector demand,
looks likely to hold strong from here.

Formerly City correspondent for The Daily Reckoning in London and head of
editorial at the UK's leading financial advisory for private investors, Adrian
Ash is the head of research at BullionVault,
where you can buy gold
today vaulted in Zurich on $3 spreads and 0.8% dealing fees.

About BullionVault

BullionVault is the
secure, low-cost gold and silver exchange for private investors. It enables
you to buy and sell professional-grade bullion at live prices online, storing
your physical property in market-accredited, non-bank vaults in London, New
York and Zurich.

By February 2011, less than six years after launch, more than 21,000 people
from 97 countries used BullionVault,
owning well over 21 tonnes of physical gold (US$940m) and 140 tonnes of physical
silver (US$129m) as their outright property. There is no minimum investment
and users can deal as little as one gram at a time. Each user's unique holding
is proven, each day, by the public reconciliation of client property with formal
bullion-market bar lists.

BullionVault is a
full member of professional trade body the London Bullion Market Association
(LBMA). Its innovative online platform was recognized in 2009 by the UK's prestigious
Queen's Awards for Enterprise. In June 2010, the gold industry's key market-development
body the World Gold Council (www.gold.org)
joined with the internet and technology fund Augmentum Capital, which is backed
by the London listed Rothschild Investment Trust (RIT Capital Partners), in
making an $18.8 million (£12.5m) investment in the business.

Please Note: This article is to inform your thinking, not lead it.
Only you can decide the best place for your money, and any decision you make
will put your money at risk. Information or data included here may have already
been overtaken by events - and must be verified elsewhere - should you choose
to act on it.